Forget Office Perks: What About Office Jerks?

A rumination, mull and thinky-think

By Ed Goldman

Not long ago, as measured in geologic time (actually, on June 12), the Wall Street Journal ran a report in its semi-regular C-Suite Strategies supplement called, “How to Tell if You’re the Office Jerk.” My immediate reaction was that if my office has a jerk, it must be me since I’m its sole employee. 

This was unsettling initially. Then I realized that the very nature of being the office jerk would seem to require that there be more than one person in that office. After all, jerkiness is usually a reflective judgment, one that mandates there be an observer/victim of said jerkiness. 

It’s a little like that old maxim, “If a tree falls in the forest and there’s no one there to hear it, does it still need to go to an environmental review committee?” At least I think that’s the old maxim. There’s also a can of Maxim instant coffee in my cupboard that’s pretty old.

“We all know who they are,” the WSJ article explains, helpfully defining the office jerk: “The colleague who takes credit for others’ contributions. The boss who seems to enjoy embarrassing subordinates. The know-it-all who won’t shut up in meetings.”

All of this means I may not be the office jerk, I’m grateful to acknowledge. Since I’m the only one here who does the work—which I’ll admit is a lofty word to describe my sitting in a room and making stuff up at my computer and drawing board—I’m not exactly hogging the kudos. Ergo: one cannot hog what one doesn’t receive. (Can I get an amen?)

Nor do I have any subordinates to embarrass, though I’m sure I’d enjoy that if I could afford to hire anybody.

And finally, I don’t have any trouble remaining silent at meetings, owing to my never having any. Even when I talk to myself during the workday, a development that’s unfortunately on the upswing along with my ageing, you can’t call these official meetings or say that I never shut up during them. Of course I do. Whenever I pause to eat or sleep.

To be sure, the article suggests remedies for office-jerk behaviors such as: (a) “Don’t wait for people to deliver the bad news” (that you’re the office jerk), (b) “Ask for feedback about ‘ideal behavior’ rather than about your own behavior;” (c) “Show that you get the message—and are working to change. And no, that doesn’t just mean a heart-felt apology;” and (d) “Don’t spend too much time worrying about being a jerk.” 

That last one’s my favorite. Because if you do steps a through c, you’re already spending too much time thinking about it. In fact, by reading this column you already may be devoting too much time to what may or may not be a problem. 

Let’s face it: You know if you’re the office jerk. Or one of a few office jerks. I add that because the larger the office, the higher the jerk count; this is verified by a number of studies in physics books, natural law manuals and Highlights for Children.